Westernization of diet has resulted in the increase of patients suffering from lifestyle-related diseases such as diabetes, hyperlipidemia, and hypertension. Some of these diseases finally lead to arteriosclerotic diseases such as myocardial infarction, angina pectoris, and cerebral infarction. Treatment of the lifestyle-related diseases is based on the improvement of lifestyle, and more specifically, on the alimentary therapy and kinesitherapy. However, such improvement of the dietary life or the lack of exercise is often difficult in the patients suffering from the “lifestyle-related diseases”, and they usually transfer to pharmacotherapy in order to prevent poor prognosis, for example, onset of myocardial infarction or cerebral infarction.
An exemplary compound having the action of improving such lifestyle-related diseases is polyunsaturated fatty acid. The polyunsaturated fatty acid is defined as a fatty acid including two or more carbon-carbon double bonds in one molecule, and the polyunsaturated fatty acids are categorized by the position of the double bond into ω3 fatty acid, ω6 fatty acid, and the like. The ω3 polyunsaturated fatty acids include α-linolenic acid, icosapentaenoic acid (EPA), and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), and the ω6 polyunsaturated fatty acids include linoleic acid, γ-linolenic acid, and arachidonic acid. Polyunsaturated fatty acids are derived from natural products, and exhibit various actions including antiarteriosclerotic action, platelet aggregation inhibitory action, hypolipidemic action, antiinflammatory action, antitumor action, and central action, and due to the high safety, polyunsaturated fatty acids are incorporated in various kinds of food, or sold as a health food or drug.
Decrease in the death rate in the patients who have history of suffering from myocardial infarction has been reported for the administration of a mixture of ethyl ester of an ω-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid EPA (EPA-E) and ethyl ester of an ω-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid DHA (DHA-E) for 3.5 years (see Patent Document 1). However, the results disclosed in Patent Document 1 relates to the secondary prevention, that is, prevention of recurrence, and the drug which is effective in the secondary prevention is not always effective in the primary prevention.
Based on the results of animal experiments and small scale clinical observations, many large scale clinical trials have been recently planned and conducted for the purpose of confirming whether various drugs which are effective in improving the lifestyle-related diseases can also prevent arteriosclerotic diseases in human. The results, however, have not necessarily been as intended, and the situation is still severe for the prevention of the occurrence of cardiovascular events in the case of patients suffering from a plurality of risk factors.
High purity EPA-E is commercially available in the trade names of Epadel™ and Epadel S™ (manufactured by Mochida Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.) as therapeutic drugs for hyperlipidemia. There has been reported that when such high purity EPA-E is orally administered at 600 mg per administration and 3 times a day immediately after meal (when TG is abnormal, the dose is increased to the level of 900 mg per administration and 3 times a day), serum T-Cho concentration can be reduced by 3 to 6%, and serum TG can be reduced by 14 to 20% (see Non-Patent Document 1). There has also been reported in The Heart Failure Society of America 2005 Annual Meeting that, based on such action, such high purity EPA-E was expected to have the effects of improving cardiovascular events in hyperlipidemia patients, and combined use with HMG-CoA RI was effective in inhibiting cardiac events in a large scale clinical trial. In this large scale clinical trial (JELIS, Japan EPA Lipid Intervention Study)), statistically significant suppression of the cardiac events by the EPA-E was confirmed for the total of the primary prevention patients and secondary prevention patients, and for the secondary prevention patients. On the other hand, in the analysis limited to the primary prevention patients, the incidence of the events was lower in the EPA-E group (the group administered with EPA-E in combination with HMG-CoA RI) compared to the control group (the group administered with solely with HMG-CoA RI), while this difference was not statistically significant. This trial also revealed that after 5 years from the start of the trial, the LDL-cholesterol value reduced by 26% in both of the EPA-F group and control group, that no significant difference was found between these groups, and that change of the HDL-cholesterol value was slight in both groups (see Non-Patent Document 2). This trial also revealed that the total cholesterol and the LDL-cholesterol decreased by 19% and 25%, respectively, in both of the EPA-E group and the control group, and that triglyceride decreased by 9% (significant) and 4% in the EPA-E group and the control group, respectively, while little change in HDL-C was noted in both of the EPA-E group and the control group (see Non-Patent Document 3). There is so far no report that has analyzed prevention of the occurrence of the cardiovascular events in the case of patients having two or more risk factors.    Patent Document 1: WO 00/48592 (JP 2002-537252 A)    Non-Patent Document 1: Drug Interview Form “EPA preparation, Epadel capsule 300”, revised in July, 2002 and February, 2004, version 21 issued in December, 2004; pp. 21-22.    Non-Patent Document 2: Medical Tribune, issue of Nov. 17, 2005, Feature article 3, pp. 75-76.    Non-Patent Document 3: Lancet, vol. 369, pages 1090 to 1098 (2007).